by A. J. Downey
“What’re you saying bro?” I asked him.
“I’ve already said too much. You should get the rest from Shells.” I nodded, Reaver didn’t know it but Shelly had opened up about it. I guess I was just wanting to hear it from multiple sources, but you know what? People in Hell wanted ice water and as far as I knew it, Shelly didn’t lie about the big stuff, the exception to that being to say that she was fine when she wasn’t.
“I really like your cousin,” I told Reaver.
“I know you do, and she’s done a lot better than I’ve seen her lately, the last couple of days. I don’t know what you’re doing, but keep it up please?” he said.
“I don’t know exactly what I’m doing either, man. I’m just trying to be what she needs rather than just what she wants. Thought maybe it might do something for her. Something good. Still trying to figure it all out though,” I shrugged a shoulder.
“What she needs is someone to stick it out. She gets scared, she starts pushing, testing limits until she breaks it so she can say ‘see, it wasn’t meant to be’ or some shit like that. She’s too used to being alone. She needs someone strong to show her she doesn’t have to be. I really don’t know what to do about the rest. She hasn’t talked about it to anyone. Hasn’t opened up,” He lowered his voice and glanced over his shoulder towards the open door, as if afraid to be overheard.
“Shelly hasn’t slept with anyone in a long time, since before what happened either. She started holding out for you man,” I bowed my head a little, shamed by a lot and nodded.
“Zander told me, that night, right before…” Reaver gripped my shoulder.
“Look, we’re more civilized than most of the other MC’s out there but rules are rules and these new cats in town… it’s a double edged sword and Shelly knows that. She loves this club. She loves the people in it and being a part of something bigger than herself. This is the family she never had but always wanted, if it comes out that she’s not puttin’ out? Then she’s done. We can’t afford to alienate any more of these guys. We already lost three interested in patching over back to their home chapters. Shelly needs to put on a good show. Man or woman you pull your weight. Everyone knows she’s no one’s old lady, now please tell me you’re picking up what I’m putting down?” I nodded but he went on, “Shelly loses this club I’m afraid she’d lose one of the last threads holding her together.” He gripped my shoulder tight and let me go.
“You need me to be cool,” I said, understanding.
“You got it. Shelly flirts with the best of ‘em but there is going to come a point when flirting is just not enough. She hasn’t gotten painted into that particular corner yet but it’s bound to happen. Dragon can’t give her a free pass forever though lord knows he would if he could,” Trigger said.
I nodded and sighed inwardly. I hadn’t thought about any of that and I berated myself for it. I needed to pay more attention to the bigger picture. With nothing left to say we three got back to work. I didn’t do much talking, I was thinking too hard instead.
The whole dynamic in the club had pretty much changed overnight because of these Suicide Cocksuckers. We were still feeling a lot of these patch-over guys out. Especially the ones that had ridden in from the North East where some of the SHMC were still running drugs and guns. Dragon and Dray had been selective when they’d put out the call but still… word gets around and some of the guys that had turned up were rougher around the edges than we would have liked. One dude having just gotten out of the penitentiary. Although to be honest, the guy who’d shown up like that we had the least to worry about. He was all for going on the straight and narrow.
We worked hard and late into the evening, showering and redressing in our designated rooms. I still found myself shaking my head when it came to how damned big the club compound was. You’d never realize it from the front, but if you went out the back and across the expansive ‘back yard’ past the corrugated steel garage/storage building, there was another outbuilding that was just as big as the main clubhouse. It had pretty much been framed on the inside, it just needed electrical and to be insulated and dry walled. Now after some weeks of work, we were in the final phases of completing what turned out to be almost a dozen separate rooms and two communal bathrooms, on at either end of the long one story out building.
The entire property was wooded, but still, an eight foot chain link fence topped with razor wire surrounded the entire perimeter. I’d once asked Dragon what the hell this place used to be and he’d grunted and told me it was an old juvie facility that had been mothballed due to its small size. It had been completely gutted when Dragon had bought it with his ill-gotten, but laundered, gains and the rest of that money and then some went into getting the front building up to code and livable for at least the officers of the club and a couple of guests. It had just taken this long for there to have been a need to finish the rest and I could tell by the gleam of pride in his eyes that he was fiercely proud that we’d pulled the rest of it together this quickly.
I was proud too. To be a part of something bigger than myself but also, because my presence here was not only welcome, but appreciated. I hadn’t felt right when I was honorably discharged from the Marine Corps. I felt cast adrift, like I didn’t have a home and I’d had a plan then. I was going to marry the girl that I’d thought had waited for me. We were going to have kids, I would start my own tow company… Then I’d walked into my fucking kitchen with that damned bouquet and all those plans turned to one big steaming pile of shit.
I was pretty much desperate to get the structure, that sense of family and brotherhood back that I’d had in the corps, and so I’d called Sgt. Howard and he’d told me to pull up stakes and try it out here for a minute to see how I liked it. I threw my shit in storage and I rode out on my bike with a duffel full of clothes. That was it.
When I got here, the first thing I thought was that the countryside was beautiful. Hilly and green with plenty of hunting. I used the money I’d had saved from my time in the corps to buy my truck and to start up my business, to put the down payment on my house. The rest, furniture and the like, had come later. Trig and I both had flown out to pick my shit up out of storage and haul it out here. He’d even paid for his own ticket. When I’d been at my lowest after coming home to find my girl barefoot and pregnant with another man’s child, Trigger had been the one to throw me a damned rope. As far as I was concerned, he’d saved my life twice now. Once over there and once over here.
There wasn’t a God damned thing, come Hell or high water or anything else that would test my loyalty when it came to him as a result and by extension my loyalty to this club and the other men in it, being as they were so important to him. Hands descended on me, slapping the back of my cut as I sat at the bar nursing a beer, turning all these thoughts over and over in my head.
“Ghosty! What you thinking about man?” Revelator asked.
“The usual. The past, women…” he let out a hissing breath.
“You need to think about something else,” he said.
“Got a lot on my plate at the moment. Life is at another crossroads.”
“This about Shelly?” he asked.
“Some of it, some of it’s about me too.”
“Shit, you’re doing some deep thinking over here ain’t you?”
“Uh yeah,” I agreed.
“Lay it on me,” he grinned, the chip in his tooth making it almost comical.
“Was gonna take Shelly up into the hills to do something special for her. Take her to see something I know she’ll like,” I said.
“What that meteor shower thing?” he asked.
“Yeah, but I’m thinking I need to do something on a bit of a grander scale.”
“Oh yeah? What did you have in mind?” he asked.
Good question. I searched my buddy’s face and felt a slow grin overtake mine.
“I have an idea, but I’m going to need some help and maybe a woman’s touch.”
“You can count me in on t
he heavy lifting but if it’s a woman’s touch you’re wanting you should try one of them hookers over there,” he gestured with his bottle of water at some of the chicks that hung around the club… chicks like Shelly, but not like her at the same time… everything that Reaver had told me came flooding back to swirl around inside my noggin.
“I think I’ll ask Hayden but I’m still going to need your help,” I said.
“As long as it doesn’t cut into my training,” he shrugged.
“Got a fight coming up?” I asked.
“Next month, bottom tier but I should work my way up fast,” his grin turned into a wicked, dangerous thing and I felt an answering smile of my own.
“Feel sorry for the poor bastard,” I said and Rev clapped me on the back hard enough to rattle my ribs like a demented wind chime. I coughed.
“Real sorry,” I wheezed.
Chapter 9
Shelly…
I smoothed my hair and blinked into the mirror at my dressing table. Ghost had been busy, and truthfully, so had I since Saturday. The mess Ashton pulled me into was going to take much longer than I anticipated to sort out. Half the pages in the boxes were waterlogged and barely legible let alone readable at all in some cases. Some of the pages were lost all together, some of them had burned and by the time we’d gotten a quarter of the way through the first box Ashton was in tears thinking about ‘what if’s’.
It was grim work, and she and I both kept exchanging grateful looks that none of the boys had been there or were seriously hurt. We’d both gone to Disney the moment he’d stepped into the garage and smooshed his fairy ass in a girl sandwich. Aaron had been nearly hysterical at the look on his boyfriend’s face and then they had both pitched in to help in whatever way they could.
We’d been at it both Saturday and Sunday when I finally got to go back to the easy stuff on Monday at Soul Fuel. I’d finished the last little bit of catching Mandy and Everett up this morning but they really hadn’t been behind. I’d found one or two discrepancies in the whole lot of it which didn’t really amount to any real losses. The girls were doing awesome.
“Hey Runt, you about ready?” I raised my eyes in the silver glass to meet my cousin’s behind me. He stood with his back against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest, face carefully neutral.
“Is he here already?” I asked.
“Not yet. I came up here more to see how you were doing,” I rubbed my hands together.
“Would you believe I’m nervous as hell?” I asked with a shaky laugh.
“Yeah,” he made no move. Didn’t push off the door frame, didn’t come across the carpet at me. He knew better. Sometimes I needed my space, I wasn’t one hundred percent sure this was one of them though.
“You look good,” he said and his lips quirked in a twitch of a smile. I looked back at my reflection rather than his. My hair was back in its short pixie cut, white-blonde bangs sweeping sideways over my forehead. I’d done my makeup, albeit lighter than I usually did. Just a little powder and some mascara, a bit of natural lip gloss.
Ghost had passed a message through Reaver at one point in the last couple of days to dress warm for tonight, but not to expect a ride. I wondered what that was about but wasn’t getting any answers. Normally surprises were fun and exciting but lately they were nerve wracking. I sat in a pair of fitted jeans and knee high riding boots with a plush gray sweater with a high neck that clung in all the right places which unfortunately for the girl I was now, were all the wrong ones.
“You look like you’re about to shit yourself Baby Cousin,” I frowned at Reaver’s reflection.
“I don’t know if I’m ready for this Reave,” I said.
“I know Babe,” he said and his eyes thawed with compassion.
“What if I… What if he?” I swallowed past the lump in my throat and shivered, but not from cold.
“Baby Cuz, it’s Ghost,” he reminded me gently, “One of my brothers, a guy Trig trusts with his life and you know how I feel about the big man.” He smiled and left himself wide open for one of my usual jokes.
“Someone should write a bromance novel about you two,” I cracked and he smiled wider.
“It’s gonna be fine. I promise, and if it isn’t…” his eyes went glacial. He didn’t need to finish that sentence. I knew full well what he meant. The doorbell rang and I stood up.
“Reaver?” I asked as I went to go past him.
“Yeah Runt?”
“If, one day I asked… If I needed to know… would you tell me?” I looked at him and his expression looked both sorrowful and afraid.
“What I did to him?”
I nodded.
“If you really wanted to know, needed to know, then yes, but I’d rather you get it from one of the other guys.” I searched his face.
“Why?” I asked. He lifted his shoulder in a shrug.
“It’s different hearing about it from one of them. I want you to still like me Shells. It’d kill me if you didn’t.” He backed out of the doorway and I thought about what he was saying and it made sense.
Hearing it from someone else would be less awful somehow, because from someone else, even Ghost, I wouldn’t really wholly believe what they were saying. Reaver though, I believed everything that came out of my cousin’s mouth as if it were gospel. Reaver would never lie to me. Never pretty it up just to make me feel better. We’d made a pact when I was ten that it would always be the truth between us no matter what and we stuck to that like glue. Reaver I could always count on, would always count on him. No matter what.
“Okay Reave, I get you,” I said and I swear his whole posture eased with relief.
“I’m a monster Cuz,” he said softly and sounded sad.
“I know Reaver,” I hugged him. “But I love you anyways and I always will.” He hugged me back and lingered a bit.
“I know I don’t say it enough Shelly but I love you,” he said and I felt my eyes get a little misted. I shoved him back and swallowed back the tears.
“Okay that’s enough. I fucking hate getting all emo and shit.” He laughed and we turned for the stairs and that’s when I looked over the railing and saw him.
Ghost looked good. Really good, in dark new jeans that rode over clean brown sturdy boots with red laces. He wore a long sleeved flannel shirt in greens and blues and whites that brought out the green at the edges of his eyes. He’d actually done something with his hair other than cram it under one of his hats and it looked a bit stiff and unnatural with the product that held it in place in the front but the look suited him.
“Hi,” he said and smiled.
“Hi,” I echoed.
“You look good, Princess.” I smiled and shook my head.
“I’m not a princess,” I told him.
“Yeah, well, maybe tonight you are,” his retort surprised me and made me blush. I went down the stairs before he could say anything else and brushed past him, grabbing my coat from the closet.
“Don’t wait up,” he said with a grin to Reaver and I stiffened, swallowing down some panic. I kept my cool. This was Ghost. Ghost didn’t want me like that, I had to remind myself.
I swung my coat over my shoulders and slid my arms into the sleeves as I stepped out onto the small front stoop. He closed the door behind us. His truck waited at the curb and, of course, he got my door for me, which made the panic at his earlier presumptive joke dissipate further.
“Where are we going?” I asked when he climbed up into the driver’s seat.
“Dinner then I’m taking you someplace special,” he declared.
“Okay,” I fastened my seatbelt and he pulled away from the curb. We rode in silence to a steak house off the highway. Not like a Roadhouse kind of joint, no this was fairly classy. A nice place.
We were seated in a quiet two person booth, a little oil lamp burning next to a slender vase with a fresh cut white carnation and some baby’s breath in it. The menu was a heavy leather bound affair and we spent several minutes in quiet contempla
tion over it. We gave the waitress our orders and were suddenly left without anything to do or say. I took my time looking him over and he did the same to me.
“Why?” I echoed my question from days ago and it made Ghost smile.
“I told you, I grew up,” he said shifting uncomfortably.
“You’re like 30 something, you’re already grown up.” He laughed.
“In some ways, not others,” he said. We sat in silence for a long time, regarding each other.
“I don’t understand.”
Ghost sighed, and folded his hands on top of the table, “I enlisted when I was eighteen. Proposed to the girl I fell in love with in high school and went straight into boot camp. By the time I got out she was with my best friend and I was being deployed,” he twisted his lips.
“I’m sorry,” I murmured.
“Came back, met another girl. Thought she was my end all of be all’s. Talked to her every chance I got through the second deployment, came home; was stupid in love… Last tour, everything was great. Everything was awesome… got off the plane and raced home to find her barefoot and pregnant with another man’s child.” He scrubbed his face with his hands.
“I’d already put in my papers, was honorably discharged and was ready to make a life with her. Put the sand behind me. All of it shot to hell worse than anything I encountered over there the second I rounded that doorway.” He shrugged.
“What did you do?” I asked.
“Called Sergeant Howard. Packed a duffel, shoved the rest of my shit in storage and moved out here. I mean sure, other shit happened and that’s the super condensed version…”
“Why are you telling me this?” I asked. My heart ached for him. I knew what it was like to be cheated on, though I had never cheated. Not once. When I started up with the club and the guys, they all knew it was strictly no strings. No one ever knew my secret; that my dumb ass was hoping one of them would sweep me off my feet or some shit. I wanted it to happen because it was meant to happen.
Ghost regarded me for a while. Our food was set in front of us but we ignored it for the time being. Finally he spoke, “Because I fucked up with you Shelly. I took you at face value and pretty much crucified you in my mind for the sins of my ex’s and it was bullshit, and now I’m looking at you all tattered and broken inside because I was a stubborn close-minded Midwestern hick. And if I’d given you the time of day,” he turned his face and looked away, sniffing. My eyes welled with tears which matched the ones in his eyes that sparkled in the little candle flame. It hit me then, hard in the center of my chest, radiating out along my nerves in a prickling rush… Ghost was really torn up over what happened to me. He really did think he was responsible.
